The Hizbullah militia lavished praise Saturday on Hafez Assad and called on Syria to follow the political course of the dead president and his likely successor, Bashar Assad.

"Hizbullah, which at all levels feels the immensity of the loss of this courageous and exceptional Arab leader, believes Syria, its army and people, have the exemplary occasion to show their loyalty to this great man by pursuing the path he has created, at the side of his dear son and carrier of his message, Colonel Bashar Assad," the head of the Islamist militia, Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, said in a statement.

Nasrallah, whose group spearheaded the campaign that ultimately forced Israeli forces out of southern Lebanon last month, recalled that the late president "spent most of his life supporting the Palestinian cause and its people and in making the dearest sacrifices for the liberation of Jerusalem and of Palestine to assure the return of its sons, without ever accepting any concession."

"It is enough for his eternal glory that he never accepted a compromise on Arabs' rights and that he never shook hands with those who usurped those rights, and that he held to that firmly, a banner in the fight of future generations of the resistance," Nasrallah said – (AFP)